Bedtime Stories
by EllieF
Summary: Kira bore as little or as much connection to reality for her as a witch in a gingerbread house turning children into snacks.


**Notes:** Written for dn_contest's Rester week. Thanks to vashti for her pre-post sanity check of it.

**Bedtime Stories**

"Brendan says his daddy says if you're not good, Kira's gonna get you," Charlotte reported cheerfully when Anthony went in to tuck her into bed, something he hadn't been able to do for weeks. Kira bore as little or as much connection to reality for her, he thought, as a witch in a gingerbread house turning children into snacks.

"Brendan's daddy shouldn't scare him like that," he said, which was both true and not likely to come back to haunt him if his chatterbox daughter repeated it. The word _thoughtcrime_ flashed into his mind, and he quickly banished it. "Kira doesn't hurt children."

That wasn't really true, he thought. There were two children he knew Kira had hurt, the one retreating behind dice or card fortresses, the other turned somehow from a kid with a smile in a sunny picture to someone who'd kill agents who were _on his side_.

"I know," Charlotte said, all five-year-old superiority. "Only bad guys."

Anthony didn't have an answer that wasn't a lie. "Did you brush your teeth?"

She bared them in a grimace.

"Beautiful." He leaned down and kissed her forehead. "Night, pumpkin."

"_Daddy_," Charlotte said. Obviously he'd violated bedtime protocol. "You hafta tell me a story."

"Oh. Yes, ma'am." He looked at the books on the nightstand. "Do you want the one with the ducklings, or the one with the moon?"

"_Tell_ me a story."

Anthony chuckled, understanding the difference. "All right." He sat down again on the edge of the bed. "What kind of story?"

"A princess story!"

At least that hadn't changed. Anthony felt less horribly out of touch. "Once upon a time, there was a princess."

"Was her name Charlotte?"

"Of course it was. No bouncing at bedtime, sweetie."

Charlotte stopped, and looked up expectantly.

"Princess Charlotte lived in a high tower, and she was happy. But the king was sad, because he had to be away from the kingdom a lot."

"That's like you, daddy."

"Oh, is it?" He smiled. "The king was busy running the kingdom, and he and his knights had to patrol all day and all night." He was making it up as he went along, but Charlotte was nodding, rapt.

"Why?"

"There was... an evil wizard, who wanted to overthrow the kingdom. He made a great darkness spread across the land. The king's smartest knight discovered where it was coming from, and they started trying to find a way to stop the spell."

Charlotte yawned. "And then what?"

"It wasn't an easy spell to counter, because the evil wizard had evil helpers, and lived far away across the water. And in the meantime the darkness kept spreading and spreading."

"And then?"

_And then another knight who was probably never __really__ a kid swept half the king's pieces off the board_, Anthony thought. "Then they knew they had to go to war. So the king said goodbye to the queen and the princess, and he promised they'd have a feast, with chicken nuggets and French fries and every flavor of ice cream, when the war was over."

He didn't know if Charlotte had heard the careful enumeration of her favorite foods. She was asleep. He tucked the blanket more securely about her, and kissed the top of her head. She still smelled like she had as a baby, milky-sweet. "Before he left," he added quietly, "the king cast a spell to hide the queen and princess, because the evil wizard was clever too, and would have hurt them if he could. The king could never let that happen. He made them forget there was a war at all, so they'd be happy while he was off fighting."

"And then what?" his wife said from the doorway.

He hadn't heard Clare come down the hall, but he wasn't surprised. "I don't know."

She held out a hand and Anthony went to her, switching off the light. "I do," she said, looking up at him with that smile he loved, the one that said she understood the things he couldn't tell her. "The queen didn't really forget. But she knew the war was a secret war, and that her husband the king had spent his whole life fighting darkness in all its forms. She cast her own spell, to protect him while he was away. She only hoped the magic would be strong enough."

"Clare." He hugged her. Even after ten years, he still marveled every time at how perfectly she fit under his chin. "I hope so too."


End file.
